


sleeping to dream about you

by orphan_account



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: M/M, Mentions of Suicide, ft an unnamed heart condition, hinata is a sunny boy, im sorry?, kags is kinda sad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-14
Updated: 2017-01-14
Packaged: 2018-09-17 10:49:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9320318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The dreams are never the same. They vary in length and magnitude – ranging from mundane summer days near a dazzling blue pond to fields of fire. In one of them, he even has wings. Still, the boy in them remains unchanging, the sunny smile on his face the only clear image amongst the confusion.





	

**Author's Note:**

> listen y'all i dont even know if this makes sense but i couldn't get the idea outta my head so naturally:

Kageyama is a sick child.

It's how his parents referred to him when he was small, apologizing to the energetic parents who tried to set up playdates with him.

He has a cardiac condition, he can't get too excited or too active because his heart might literally beat itself to death. He remembers the first time it happened, running laps around the playground in elementary and collapsing soon after, his blood suddenly very loud in his ears. It's very painful, the hammering of his heart against a ribcage that feels brittle and a faint, coppery smell that makes him want to vomit.

From that point on he avoids getting excited. It's not like he can't go out or laugh along with friends (though, he's never been very good at making those) but it's just that it feels like a chore. He figures he might as well starve out his youth by staring out his bedroom window, watching the leaves and the seasons change with a degree of emotional detachment. He'll make up for his sulking when he's older, by traveling the world or something.

(It's a joke. He can't ride airplanes.)

Kageyama is a sick child, but he doesn't care. He prefers to move through his stretching days with apathy either way.

The first time he has a dream about a sunny haired boy, it's a winter night and his sheets are doing a poor job of keeping him warm. He keeps growing, annoyingly enough, and his gangly feet are poking from the edge of the blanket and leaving his toes cold in the frigid air. He's too lazy to do anything but curl up on his side instead, and just like that he's asleep.

He feels a weird falling sensation, like he's slowly sinking through air and water all at once, until his bare feet land softly on springy grass. The colors around him are muted and dull, but he can make out a rusty swing set and a park bench in the haze. He takes a cautious step forward. The grass feels real against his skin.

There is a figure, he realizes, crouched weirdly on the park bench. Out of all the hues of navy blue and ashen grey, he sees brilliantly orange tufts of hair. "Hello?" Kageyama calls out, and the stranger turns around, his eyes glowing in the darkness.

"Kageyama," the boy's mouth moves but no sound comes out. Despite this, Kageyama knows exactly what he's saying. "I've been waiting for you."

He doesn't ask how he knows his name, or who he is, because he's content just to watch the boy stand and stretch. A faint, golden hue tumbles off him and lights up the dim setting. Kageyama sees his clothes, a white t-shirt and black sweatpants, ruffle in a breeze that seems to only affect him.

 _He's very beautiful,_ Kageyama thinks, and then he's awake.

His heart is pounding in his ears, the thumps echoing and rattling around his head, making his vision swim and his fingertips ache. He clutches a hand to his chest, envisions the golden glow of the mysterious boy, and his heart slows down a little.

The next morning is painfully ordinary. His mom wakes him up with a kiss on his cheek, tells him there's breakfast downstairs. He smells the fried eggs before he's even out of his room, his stomach rumbling pleasantly. But he can't eat them – instead he chews rice porridge that leaves a sour taste in his mouth.

"You know you can't have grease." Kageyama's mom says while wiping down the counters. Nowadays she cleans everything twice, not content with the state of the house until it's bleached white and shining. He thinks it might have something to do with his dad's business trips conspicuously stretching longer than they should.

Kageyama nods, and that's that.

He's on the couch watching cartoons when he begins to doze off, his head lolling off the side of the cushion. Distantly, he notices the sound of the tv getting duller, until it's complete white noise, and he's falling again.

There's no dark park this time, just a busy city street in a filter of black and white. He looks down at his hands, notices dimly that he's the only person fully colored. He's in his pajamas awkwardly enough, but the passerby do not give him a second glance and continue to bustle around him.

He's never had dreams this vivid before. Dreams where he could feel every touch, sound, and smell as if he were wide awake. In the past he's only dreamt like choppy picture films, only retaining bits of what actually happened.

He begins to walk forward, eyes slinking from the cars honking and inching forward a centimeter at a time, to the neon signs of the ramen shops and convenience stores he occasionally passes. _What is the point of this,_ he wonders.

Until he sees a golden hue turn the corner in front of him. He's half jogging then, trying desperately not to lose sight of the faint splash of color in this grey world. Once he spots him properly, the boy with the orange hair is ducking into a grocery store. He realizes then, that everything the boy touches springs to life with color. He sees him run his fingertips along a basket of fruits, watches the dull grey of the bananas turn into a buttercup yellow.

"Hey!" he shouts, and the boy is giggling. He has yet to see his face properly and is anxious to see what it looks like without the eerie shadows obscuring it. He stops, turns around and cocks his head at Kageyama.

"Hello." he hums in that same, soundless voice from before. He is indeed beautiful. His hair is messy and blowing in that imaginary breeze again, and his nose is a pretty ski slope that is littered with faint freckles. His mouth is small and quirked up into a smile, his lips pink and just a little chapped. "Isn't it sad?" he asks, not phased by Kageyama's blatant stare.

Kageyama frowns. "What?"

The boy takes a step closer and is peering up at him. Kageyama swallows uncomfortably, takes a little pride in the fact that he's at least a head taller, and then repeats his question.

The boy shakes his head and looks away, his fingers reaching out to brush against the sleeve of his jacket. Kageyama recoils, watching in shock as grey begins to spread where the fabric was previously maroon.

"That I can't touch you yet."

He wakes up.

He feels a sad lurch in his chest at the realization that he's back in his plain old living room. His heart isn't pounding like it had been the night before, which is good, but he feels an odd weight of disappointment. He figures it's the heavy blanket his mother must have covered him with while he snoozed.

(It's not, but it's easier to pretend the feeling is as tangible as the soft fabric of the quilt.)

From that point on, the boy is in every one of his dreams. It's been a month already, and he's had enough conversations with him to find out that he's the same age as him, and that his favorite subject in school is geography because he likes to make the borders of the counties look like dinosaurs. There are many more tiny character aspects that Kageyama filters out delicately from their exchanges. He's too complex to be a figment of Kageyama's imagination, so he dedicates himself to finding out his name.

Except, he can't. Because when the fifty something questions are ready to burst out of his mouth he's blinking himself awake, back in a reality he doesn't care much for.

The dreams are never the same. They vary in length and magnitude – ranging from mundane summer days near a dazzling blue pond to fields of fire. In one of them, he even has wings. Still, the boy in them remains unchanging, the sunny smile on his face the only clear image amongst the confusion.

One particular night, they're standing on the summit of a mountain. The snow is whipping harshly against his face and his thin sweater, chilling him to the very bone. He's sure his eyelashes are covered in frost and that his lips are blue, but for some reason he can't seem to feel the biting pain of the blizzard as much as he feels the warmth emnating from the boy.

He's walking on the snow like it's as sturdy as hardwood floors, not leaving behind a single footstep. His golden aura is stronger, and seems to repel any snow that comes its way. His fiery hair is a welcoming sight amongst the flurries, and Kageyama reaches out with his frozen hand, stiffly trying to grasp the intangible.

They have never touched. Never even remotely brushed hands or bumped shoulders. The boy points this out a lot with a sad look. It's curious, considering how often they find themselves together in bizarre worlds, and how much they talk, that there's still so many unanswered questions hanging between them. He doesn't know his name, his touch, or his voice.

It bothers him more than it should.

But he has no room to complain anymore, because the boy is reaching through the snow and grabbing his hand. All of a sudden, it's like the sun itself is seeping into his skin, warming his body from the tip of his nose to the tip of his toes. Before he has the chance to process this, he's awake.

This time his heart sends him to the hospital.

It takes him six different injections and a shock from a paddle to calm down. He's not sleeping, which bothers him, because if he's sleeping he won't be feel the tight discomfort in his chest, and maybe he'll get to touch the boy again. His mother weeps, clutching his hand where it lies limp. His eyes are closed, and he could squeeze back, let her know he's fine, but he doesn't for some reason.

The doctor comes and he opens his eyes, his mother weeps some more, and the doctor asks if he's in pain. He says yes, lies, because he knows he'll get the drugs that make him sleepy – and he will finally dream.

He dreams he's back on the mountain, but this time the snowstorm is gone and there are flowers sprouting out of the fresh powder. He doesn't see the boy, so he looks and looks, stepping over jagged rocks and scaling icy ledges that he's sure in real life would crumble under his weight. Finally, he sees an orange head of hair sitting on a pile of snow, the golden glow so bright it hurt his eyes.

"Hey." Kageyama says, overwhelmed suddenly. The boy turns around with a grin, his little canines poking his bottom lip.

"You should calm down. I don't want you hurting." the boy says, patting the snow next to him. Kageyama sits. It's not cold; it feels like a fresh spring hill.

Kageyama blinks, confused. "You knew what happened?" He's starting to hate this feeling of not knowing; not knowing whether or not the boy is something his mind came up with to make him feel less lonely.

"Of course." The boy holds out his palm. "I can touch you now, see?" He laces their fingers together and Kageyama's heart races, but it doesn't hurt – it's pleasant; fluttering.

"What does that have to do with... Who are you?" The question finally bursts from his lips, and for once he isn't waking up.

The boys smiles, so bright and so brilliantly it's almost blinding. Kageyama wants to bottle it up; store it in a glass mason jar and cup his hands greedily around the sunshine. He's so beautiful, it hurts to not know if he's real or not.

"I'm Hinata. Hinata Shouyou."

Kageyama starts crying – with relief, he thinks. Because now there's a name to the face, and it's foreign and authentic in a way that his mind would simply fail to conjure. Hinata wipes his tears without question, his fingertips leaving a tingling sensation in their wake.

After that he has many more dreams where Hinata and him touch. No matter how small, or how casual, Kageyama finds any physical contact he makes with Hinata (God, he loves saying his name) sends a delicious electricity running through his veins.

Unfortunately, the morning always comes. He finds himself taking more naps, locking himself in his room and squeezing his eyes shut so hard it's borderline painful. Sometimes he hears his mom talking on the phone outside his door; she's worried.

_"He's sleeping a lot. I think he might be depressed."_

Kageyama doesn't care. He doesn't care for much anymore if it's not relevant to Hinata. What this means, he's not sure.

One night, they have wings again. Hinata's are black and gleam blue in the light, extending at least eight feet from his back. His are just a bit smaller, but they're still magnificent. They never fly, instead opting to hand hold near a rocky ledge that overlooks a landscape of clouds.

"What's the point of all this?" he asks Hinata. Hinata's wings rustle until they're folding around the duo, shading them from the brilliant rays of the sunset.

"I don't know. I just know I'm happy when I'm with you." Hinata says. Suddenly he's very close, and Kageyama can count every freckle dotted on his nose and cheeks. He flushes, taking a step forward. Hinata's still glowing, and he wants to close the gap between them with his own aura, but before he can get any closer, he's in his bed.

He sits up, his heart thumping weakly under his pajama shirt. He touches his face to feel wetness rolling down his cheeks. Tears, he realizes distantly.

 _I'm happy too,_ he had wanted to say.

After that, he doesn't dream for a while. His mom takes him to the doctor; his heart is tested in a million new different ways. And then his doctor is scribbling a therapist's name on a slip of paper and handing it to his mother, who looks a little defeated.

"I don't want to go," is the first thing out of his mouth when they leave. His mom purses her lips, looks away, and that's that.

He ends up going. The therapist's name is Sugawara Koushi, and he has pale hair and a mole under his left cheek. He looks young, his early thirties maybe, but his behavior has that rare kindness that makes him seem older; wiser. He kind of treats Kageyama like a kid, which is annoying since he's almost seventeen, but it's fine. He'll go to make his mom stop frowning, and then he'll sleep.

"How are you?" Sugawara asks while Kageyama is sat lazily in a comfortable arm chair. His eyes slide all over the office before he answers. He takes in the shelves of books with dog eared pages, and the old coffee machine humming silently on the table near the door.

"I'm fine." Kageyama finally says. "Listen, my mom is just over exaggerating..." he trails off at the calculating look in Sugawara's eyes. His hands are folded and his chin rests on them, his pale hair falling in his face as he cocks his head. Kageyama swallows. He feels a little uncomfortable.

Sugawara finally sighs, sitting up straight. "Sleeping too much is a little concerning. But let's talk about you for a bit. Tell me about how your winter break's going."

 _It's just dandy, Suga,_ Kageyama wants to say. _I started having dreams about an angel and now everything tastes foul when I'm awake._

He settles for, "It's been fine, really."

After the session Kageyama's mom decides he should go once a week. He compromises, because she has that look on her face and he doesn't want to cause her anymore trouble.

Later that night, his father calls and says he'll be in Tokyo two weeks longer. His mom cries after she thinks he goes to bed, but he lingers by the stairs and thumps his forehead on the wall, his chest hurting. He wants to see Hinata. He wants to feel the heat of those small hands thumbing away his tears.

He doesn't see him that night either, but he swears he feels a golden warmth surround him as his heavy eyelids flutter shut.

When he finally sees him again, it's on the last day of break. Kageyama is tossing and turning restlessly at the thought of having to go back to waking up early in the morning, and having to listen to the annoying clusters of girls in Class B whisper about their attractive senpais.

Sleep finally comes, its gentle hands splaying open and he's falling again. There's an endless horizon and an inch of water underneath his sock clad feet. The sky above is blue and cloudy, reflected perfectly on the shallow surface. The water is still, but ripples whenever he takes a step, sending rings of a distorted sky echoing out to every corner.

Across from him is Hinata, still wearing his white t-shirt and black sweatpants. His hair is the same ruffling orange it always is, but the golden glow that's usually around him is absent. For once, he looks normal – just another boy Kageyama's age (but he's still beautiful).

"Hinata." His name sits on his tongue just right. He wants to say it forever.

"You can ask me whatever you want."

Kageyama falls on his knees, his pulse a staccato beat in his ears. He's just heard Hinata's voice, a brilliant symphony of high and low syllables that go a little rough around the edges. He doesn't need his aura, Kageyama realizes, because his voice is golden enough as it is. It reminds Kageyama of when he heard christmas bells for the first time when he was six years old in the holiday square.

"Who are you?" he asks again. His name isn't enough anymore. "Why do you keep appearing in my dreams? Are you real or did I make you up? Why do I feel so horrible without you?" Question after question tumbles out of his shaking lips. Where he kneels, the water is soaking his pants uncomfortably. He stands back up on wobbly knees.

"I was alive once, though I don't remember much. I woke up somewhere white, and something told me I couldn't move on yet, that I had to wait for somebody. One day, you showed up at the park and I knew." Hinata says, his golden voice warm. "Truth is, I don't know much more than you. Maybe you should ask around, Kageyama-kun; try and remember for me."

He's awake.

The next day he asks the guidance counselor if she knew a Hinata Shouyou. Her aged face pales considerably, tells him gently she doesn't know him, and that's that. Kageyama feels a weird rattle in his chest and he tells his heart to shut up and hold out.

He asks his teacher after lunch. He shakes his balding head and tells him to go back to his math equations. Kageyama curls his fists inside his jacket pockets.

That night he and Hinata are underwater, swimming through colorful reefs and schools of tropical fish swirling around each other like a whirlpool.

"They're hiding something." Kageyama tells Hinata. His words come out like bubbles, a weird gurgle to them, but Hinata understands. He always does.

He swims over to Kageyama and laces their fingers. Kageyama looks down and studies their entwined hands. He likes the way his hand dwarfs Hinata's. He likes being bigger than him. It makes him feel like he's the one protecting him, and not the other way around.

He finally finds out who Hinata is through his mom.

She slaps her hands over her mouth when he asks, a sad, sad look crossing her face. Kageyama's heart starts up its painful rhythm as she tells him.

"I thought you had forgotten about him... He was your best friend when you were a little boy, but he moved away in your second year of elementary. You don't remember when you guys would play on that old playground down the street?" His mom's voice is sweet with nostalgia. He closes his eyes and tries to remember.

 _Yeah,_ he thinks distantly. He remembers those orange tufts of hair feeling soft in his pudgy fingers. But that's all.

"Where can I find him?" Kageyama asks earnestly, his heart thrashing against its cage wildly at the thought of being able to see Hinata in the real world.

Kageyama's mom is silent for a long, long time.

"He killed himself last year, Kageyama." And that's that.

When he sees Hinata that night, he's screaming and crying and feeling too many things at once. Hinata is crying too, thrusting himself into Kageyama's arms and wetting his t-shirt with salty tears. It's the first time they've been this close since they fluttered their wings on the rocky mountain ledge.

"Why did you leave me?" Kageyama is whispering into his hair. _Yeah,_ he remembers now. The pebbles Hinata threw his way when he was trying to get him to play with him. He remembers Hinata's sweaty hand in his as they scouted for pennies amongst the weeding grass near the playground. But most of all, he remembers this, whispering _"we'll see each other again"_ into Hinata's hair as said's mom called him over where the moving truck stood waiting.

"I don't know." Hinata cries and cries until there's nothing left between them but heavy silence and the occasional shuddering breath.

Kageyama realizes he's in love with him.

His weekly visits with Sugawara are uneventful, but today Kageyama asks him about soulmates.

"Do you believe in them?" His head is resting against a purple pillow, his arms held above him as he spreads and closes his fingers. He watches as the intensity of the light bulb overhead fades when there are no gaps between his fingers, then blinks against the brightness when they're spreading apart.

Sugawara hums, taps his chin, and leans forward. "I think I do. It's lonely to think otherwise." Kageyama is quiet at that. Suga takes this as an invitation to continue. "Do you, Kageyama-kun?"

 _"Kageyama-kun."_ The memory of that golden voice rattles in his chest like a bag of coins.

"Yeah." he says. Sugawara tries to ask him why he asked, Kageyama stays quiet.

The dream he has that night is the best one of them all.

They're at an airport, suitcases tight in their grips as they hand their boarding passes to the dapper looking man at the gate. Kageyama doesn't know where they're going, but he doesn't care. He'll go anywhere as long as he's with Hinata. He tells him this.

"Even hell?" Hinata questions, his eyes playful.

"Yes." There is no hesitation.

Kageyama decides then and there he never wants to wake up again. He doesn't want to live in a world without Hinata anymore. He wants to stay here, in the comfortable airplane seats with Hinata's bony shoulder digging into his upper arm. In a world where he can ride airplanes without worrying about his heart, and most of all in a world where he can love Hinata with all he's got.

They kiss in that dream. Kageyama's nervous hands are cupping Hinata's soft cheeks, and his lips are pressing against his chapped ones. It's beautiful.

When he wakes up he cries for a long, long time.

He's not doing so good in school anymore. He keeps falling asleep in class, starts snapping at his classmates when they attempt to talk to him, and he can no longer enjoy his lunch like he used to. In fact, all food is starting to taste bland to him.

He wonders briefly if he's dying. It scares him that he doesn't care.

When he meets Sugawara, he tells him he's thinking of killing himself. Sugawara doesn’t say much, just asks why and scribbled onto his little notepad, his half rimmed glasses slipping down his nose. For the next two weeks he's put on suicide watch, and diagnosed officially with depression.

His mom doesn't do much but cry, pets his hair and tells him she loves him. Kageyama just feels empty.

He dreams in short bursts after his diagnosis. It annoys him that his time with Hinata starts to feel no longer than five minutes. He thinks it has something to do with the anti-depressants he's prescribed to.

He meets with Sugawara twice a week now, and Sugawara never pushes him to talk, just listens to him ramble about anything and everything, his warm brown eyes soft. They talk about galaxies, the acids in the human brain, and whether or not chicken tastes good with onigiri. It's nice, he thinks.

It kind of feels like he's talking to Hinata sometimes, but with less oxymorons and less emotion.

He falls asleep on the car rides home, and dreams of strawberries and rusty playgrounds.

The final piece of the puzzle falls that night. He thinks he almost feels the universe shift, slotting into place as he senses that same pull of gravity sending him falling into his dream world; to Hinata. This time they're back at the rusty swing set, but the sky is ablaze with the brightest sunset Kageyama has ever seen. It looks like an oil painting, swirls of peach and pink and orange and red and a thousand other colors all dancing around each other on a canvas that seems to stretch to infinity.

The park bench Hinata is sat on is sprouting with flowers, the grooves of the metal being filled with roots of daisies and roses. Everything looks gold, especially Hinata, whose brown eyes are honey in the light. Kageyama sits next to him, breathes in, and pulls him close.

"I love you." he tells him. Hinata's hair is still ridiculously blowing in a breeze that only surrounds him, and the strands tickle Kageyama's nose as he inhales. He feels Hinata's arms wrap around his middle, squeezing tight.

He's afraid to let go, but most of all he's afraid to wake up.

"I love you more." Hinata is whispering where his face is smushed into Kageyama's chest. He wonders if Hinata can hear the wild thumping of his heart against his brittle ribcage. It's not painful anymore, instead a vivid reminder that his heartbeat in this world is realer than when he's awake.

"I don't want to wake up." he tells him, pulling back and cupping his cheeks, voice serious. Hinata's small hands reach up to curl around his wrists, his eyes watery.

"You have to." The gold in his voice sounds more like silver now. It bothers Kageyama more than it should.

"No." He leans forward to kiss away the tear that rolls out of Hinata's right eye. He kisses his other eye for good measure, then his nose, forehead, and finally – his lips. He shakily exhales before closing the gap between them, his eyes fluttering shut at the feel of that warm, warm mouth on his.

"Kageyama, this was a mistake. I should have never come here... Then you would want to live. You would have been fine without me." Hinata is crying now, his trembling hands pressing against his eyes in an attempt to stem the salty tears rolling down his cheeks and dripping off his chin.

"Shut up, you absolute idiot." he says. "Before you I was determined to live my days in apathy. It's because of you I can dream about sunsets like this, and dream of us having wings, and riding airplanes. God, you're an idiot." Kageyama is crying too now, but he makes no move to wipe the tears. He wants Hinata to see.

"Don't make my mistake, Kageyama." Hinata pleads into his shirt. "You still have a chance."

"It's not a chance if it's not with you." Hinata's hair smells like bubblegum and grass. The flowers around them begin to grow larger, twisting their stems into intricate spirals as peonies and lilies sprout around them. Hinata's shoulders have stopped shaking. "You said you were waiting for me." Kageyama adds on for good measure.

_This is what you were waiting for._

That night Kageyama and Hinata end up holding hands on the swing set. When it's time to go, Hinata stands, claps the flower petals off his lap where he was trying to make a flower crown for Kageyama.

("Boke," Kageyama tells him. "You can't do that for shit." Hinata giggles.)

He offers him his hand, and Kageyama is pleased to see the golden glow spreads to his body as he takes it, pulling himself up. The breeze that greedily blows around Hinata hesitantly shares its wind, ruffling his dark bangs as they walk toward the direction of the sun.

Kageyama's heart stops working that night, but somewhere in a far away dream, it's humming happily in his chest as he walks into eternity with a sunny haired boy.


End file.
